mmmm sleepy drunk slow network so this will be a quickie (also propped up in bed typing one handed). party tonight in honour of krystle's last day; lots of food and wine. so full. she had made little cards for all of us with pictures that she had drawn of each of us. very sweet. finished feet painting, will post tomorrow in thouars. ooh, just found out that fontevraud abbey, where eleanor of aquitaine (youthful obsession, for those not related to me) and henry 2 are buried, along with richard the lionheart and bad king john, is not 25 minutes from here by car. may have to go on a petit pilgrimage next weekend when pau comes to visit avec son rental car.

at the party tonight, miniM (cute 3 year old) was crawling around on all fours pretendingto be a cat; i asked her what her cat name was, and she said, (remember, age three, exclusively french speaking), "carole king." love it. long discussion with P (in french! okay, he was doing most of the talking, and i was just asking questions once every five minutes, but still! at least half a gold star for me) about quebecois history and politics, which was very interesting. apparently the anti-francophone sentiment was so entrenched in the earlier part of the twentieth century that the english translation exam required of francophone applicants to the civil service was titled 'intelligence test' (!)

Head Honcho said tonight at the party that this was the best group they had ever had, both in terms of artistic ability and lack of psychopaths. i asked for horror stories, and he said there was a lady last year who was actually clinically demented with some kind of terminal neurological degenerative condition, whose husband (we think) wrote a false application for her (sending a portfolio of work she had done when she was younger, before she got sick), and stuck her on the train to angers so that someone else would be stuck taking care of her while he went on holiday. unbelievable.

okay, beauty sleep time. hope all are well.